eMOLT Weekly Update 2022-10-28 Weekly RecapThis week’s write up is a late one. My kids’ preschool was closed this week because their teacher’s son got COVID, so I’ve been working weird hours to make up for normal hours taking care of them.
We’ve started to get in the first loggers of the season from participants in the traditional (non-realtime) eMOLT program. JiM and I will be processing those together this fall, so just a reminder to please send them either to the lab at 166 Water Street, Woods Hole, MA 02543 or to JiM’s house at 21 Pleasantview Avenue, Falmouth, MA 02540. The first logger this year belonged to Captain Bobby Ingalls fishing out of Bucks Harbor, ME. The plot of his data going back to 2008 is shown below. 2021 is plotted in blue and 2022 is plotted in red. Note that the 2022 data have not passed through the QA/QC check yet, so there are some weird points at either end of the series.
Figure 2 – Data from Bobby Ingalls’ logger, 2008-present. 2021 is plotted in blue and 2022 is plotted in red. Note that the 2022 data have not passed through a QAQC check. We’ve also been busy on the realtime side of the project. Today, Huanxin got started early and visited the F/V Virginia Marie in Sandwich to troubleshoot some issues. Then, he and I met at the F/V Charger in Hyannis before driving up to Provincetown to meet with our collaborators Owen Nichols from the Center for Coastal Studies and Captains Willis King of the F/V Donna Marie and Mike Russo of the F/V Adventure. While there, we were able to troubleshoot problems on both vessels and wrap up the MassTech program by installing a Lowell Deck Data Hub on the F/V Rolex for Captain Bob Dutra.
Realtime Summary (Vessels with Rockblock Satellite Transmitters)This week, we received 25 haul-averaged reports from 7 vessels.
Figure 6 – eMOLT weekly status plot In the figure above, you can see the approximate locations where we received “Status Reports” (a ping from your system letting us know that it’s still working) and “Data Uploads” (actual temperature / depth data collected by your probes). The “Status Reports” come in every 12 hours or so when a system is powered up. “Data Uploads” only come in when you haul the probes. If you were out fishing and don’t see your approximate locations on here, please reach out because there may be a problem with your system or with the data plumbing on our end. Other ScienceThe water samples from Captain David Marsh on the F/V Grace Sarah from a few weeks back were analyzed by the CCS plankton lab. The samples looked normal for this time of year and weren’t cloudy or brown. However, a conversation with David revealed that the samples were taken near the surface of the water column. Karenia, a genus of plankton that can turn water murky and brown and is responsible for red tides, hypoxic zones, and other unpleasant things tends to congregate near the thermocline. Dr. Amy Costa at the Center for Coastal Studies doesn’t expect any more blooms this season, but… in her words,
Thanks for the heads up and being willing to grab those samples David! Another hearty thanks goes out to captain Gator Silvia of the F/V Nathaniel Lee. Gator and his crew deployed two surface drifters together on the shelf edge southeast of Cape Cod at the end of August. The drifters are now hundreds of miles apart, with one south of Nova Scotia and the other approaching The Grand Banks.
Finally, thank you to captain David Goethel who sent along some cool pictures of a juvenile African Pompano sighted at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. Juveniles of this species have evolved long fins as a defense against predators. There appears to be some debate among evolutionary biologists as to whether the fins are supposed to mimic a jellyfish or simply make the juvenile look bigger. Either way, it’s a pretty neat thing to see. African pompanos are a warmer water species, but periodically show up north of the Carolinas, especially during hurricane season.
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All the best, -George |
Figure 1 – My daughter exploring the commercial pier in Woods Hole. She decided this boat was her favorite because of its “long beautiful green hair”
Figure 3 – Huanxin tackles a software problem on Captain Phil Michaud’s F/V Charger in Hyannis.
Figure 4 – The three vessels we visited this afternoon, (L-R, F/V Adventure, F/V Rolex, F/V Donna Marie)
Figure 5 – Huanxin and George bolt a new temperature profile to the dredge on the F/V Donna Marie. Photo credit: Owen Nichols
Figure 7 – Tracks of the drifters deployed from the F/V Nathaniel Lee in Augutst 2022.
Figure 8 – African pompano